Chocolate Cures All
by Starblaze and Solaris
Summary: Remus has everything cramps, and Lily helps him out. Then Lily has stomach cramps, and Remus returns the favour. RLSB and LEJP with James in love and Lily in tolerance of all things Marauder.
1. The Lycanthrope

**Warning!: This has to be forewarned against, for some strange reason: this contains pre-slash in the first chapter, then slash in the second, although that is not the central focus. Kinda. It wasn't supposed to be, anyway.**

**Flames will keep us warm because it ****_snowed_**** in bleeding****_ April_****. ****_Snowed._**

**Sol: This idea has been floating around the computer hard drive for what, three, mebbe four years? It was high time it was written, although it seemed to have a mind of its own. It was supposed to be centred on the Lily-Remus friendship, originally, but that has faded a little.**

**Star: I'll say. Ladies, gents, and fanfiction writers, here is our first chapter fic, although it only has two chapters.**

**Sol: Star, if you want any more, write and post it yourself. I'm done here, and I was in a bad enough mood anyway when I wrote the second chapter, so some of my grumpiness has been transferred to Lily.**

**Star: Oh, and we apologise if 'chit' is not actually an Irish thing. It just seemed to fit, even though we know none of the boys were Irish.**

**Rating: K, or K+. Star, your call, I'm feeling lazy.**

**Genre: Friendship**

**Disclaimer: We own more chocolate than is probably healthy, and some really painful stomach cramps, but we do not own Harry Potter.**

**Chocolate Cures All**

The Lycanthrope

Remus twitched, pulling out of the deep fog of warm sleep. His muscles protested and an itch on the arch of his foot made itself known. The soft, plush armchair had been comfy enough to be made of clouds when he had curled up in it several hours earlier, but now it had solidified, turned hard and unyielding within its confines. His knees were suddenly digging painfully into his collarbones, and every single muscle ached almost tangibly with the aftermath of the moon. He gritted his teeth and told himself to uncurl, to stand. Nothing happened. After a moment, the itch in his foot reminded him of its presence by growing in size and ferocity. He bit back a groan of irritation, and unwrapped an arm from around his thighs. Pain shot through the limb, and the groan escaped, but his hand reached his foot and scratched through the sock, and the itch was relieved.

A hand on his shoulder made him jump, as much as he could when trapped in the foetal position, but the hand was small and the fingers slim, the thumbnail slightly bitten. A stray freckle at the join of wrist and palm caught his attention, and he smiled, although the movement turned the ache in his cheeks into sharp lines of pain along the muscles.

"Hello Lily," he croaked, and a freckled, green-eyed, red-framed face appeared in his view.

"Hello to you too. How're you feeling? You didn't sound too happy about waking up in the common-room." Her eyes shone with genuine care and only a hint of amusement. Remus pulled his face into a smile again.

"No, I wasn't. Mind you, I chose this armchair over the sofa, so it's my own fault."

Lily's eyebrows raised in invitation to continue.

"We were… overactive last night, and Miss Prefect would not want to know." The eyebrows look dissolved into a smile and a small chuckle.

"Of course that's what you'd say. I suppose your illicit activities were well-illuminated by last night's full moon."

Remus would have tensed, but his muscles were already tightly knotted. As it was, the smile slipped from his face, and Remus' amber eyes widened.

"Err… yes, I, er, suppose they were… You didn't hear anything in the grounds last night, right?"

"Of course not Remus. I didn't hear a single person. There was, however, a very loud sort of howling which came whistling through my window when the wind blew it… I don't suppose you'd know anything?"

"N-no…"

"Calm down Remus, I'm no executioner or prejudiced brat to see you hurt because you encountered something furry while outdoors."

"Lily… please, if you mean what I think you do… don't tell anyone, please, just let me get my NEWTs, I've never harmed you, I won't ask anything else of you, but please let me get my NEWTs, OWLs aren't enough, and I'll understand if you want nothing to do with me, but for all the years we were friends –" Lily interrupted the frantic, quiet babble.

"Were friends? Remus, we _are_ friends. I know all about your affliction, and you being ill makes no difference to me, except I'll have to take care of you every now and then."

Remus felt his eyes well with tears, but his ego threatened him with bodily harm and they didn't fall. He opened his mouth, found his throat choked and shut it again. He swallowed, and this time managed to breathe:

"Thank you," to Lily's expectant expression. She rolled her eyes.

"You're forgetting that I'm Muggle-born," she reminded him. "You being lycanthropic simply makes you sick in my eyes. It makes you an ill, _human_ teenager, who needs a bit of help once a month, and trust me, I know what _that_ feels like. I've got just the thing, too."

She swept her eyes from Remus' grateful, touched expression, and dug a hand into her pocket. From it she pulled a large bar of milk chocolate, which she opened and snapped a square off. She offered it to him, held loosely in her fingertips, so he stretched out the arm not trapped beneath him to take it and deposit it in his mouth. The pleasant taste of sugar, milk and cocoa flooded over his tongue as the square melted, and he could feel himself relaxing, his twinging muscles loosening enough for him to wriggle around onto his back and start to push his legs out over the arm of the chair. Unfortunately, his legs didn't get the memo, and remained uncomfortably curled above him.

"Owowowowowowowowww…" he groaned, trying to force his muscles to obey him. Lily laughed, handed him the chocolate, and reached up to gently pull his legs down onto the soft red fabric. Nimble fingers stroked his calves into relaxing as more chocolate-flavour flooded his mouth, and he let out a moan of mixed relief and pain just as Sirius stumbled through the portrait hole, arms laded with an assortment of foods. As he caught sight of them, his jaw dropped and the grin slid off his face.

"_Evans?_" he said incredulously. "Are you molesting Moo- Remus?"

Lily laughed, her hands not ceasing to knead at the blond boy's calves, knees and thighs. That combined with the chocolate earned her another moan, as one leg finally unbent enough to rest its weight on the arm. Her fingers moved to the other leg, and started working again as she replied,

"Of course not Black! I know you're the only one who's allowed to make Remus moan, after all." She shot him a wink, then laughed again as colour flooded his cheeks.

"Don't be ridiculous Evans," he snapped, his usually pristine image suddenly cracked. "But you know James fancies her, Remus, so don't go shagging on the sofa. _And_ I brought you food, if you're up for it."

Remus wriggled a bit so he could see Sirius without removing his leg from Lily's soothing grasp. He passed Sirius a grateful smile, and lifted his arm.

"You could come and break the chocolate for me, or give Lily a hand," he told the dark-haired boy. "My muscles have solidified."

For a fraction of a second, Sirius' eyes were unreadable, but then he stepped forward and put his armful on the table, and the moment was gone. Remus held the chocolate out to Sirius, then whimpered as Lily hit a knot and dug her thumbs in. It was probably a good thing that Sirius was holding the chocolate then, because at that noise his grip tightened until his knuckles were white, and the bar snapped in two. The noise seemed to bring him back to himself, and he shot Remus a rueful grin as he broke off a smaller piece. But instead of handing Remus the chocolate square, Sirius held it to the smaller boy's lips, which wafted warm breath over his fingers as Remus spoke.

"This is the life," he sighed, eyes fluttering closed as he accepted the rich food, swallowed and continued. "Waited on hand and foot. A massage and chocolate, the perfect cure for cramps."

"Which you wouldn't have had if you hadn't spent the entire afternoon and evening curled in that chair and not moved _at all_," said Sirius cheerily, back to his usual happily teasing self.

Remus raised an eyebrow at him and opened his mouth to speak, only to find it occupied again with chocolate. His leg twitched, and a pained whimper escaped him as Lily dragged her fingers across the knot in his calf again, and suddenly Sirius was gone from his side, down to his legs, and Lily's delicate fingers were replaced by Sirius' powerful, masculine hands. They rubbed circles into the taut, wiry muscles of the smaller boy's leg, kneading gently and relaxing the limb. In turn, Lily's scent moved up towards his head, and a moment later she was visible again, her hand outstretched to drop a chocolate square into his open palm. When he crooked an eyebrow at her, she responded with a slight smirk and a murmured,

"I think he'd throttle me if I went anywhere near your mouth, so I'm not going to spoon-feed you."

Remus smiled in thanks, ate the chocolate (relishing the sweetness now coating his tongue) and shut his eyes. As he started to doze off again, he felt the hands leave his now limp legs and powerful arms push under his shoulders and knees to lift him against a firm chest. On instinct, he snuggled further into the arms, towards the warmth, and felt more than heard a breath catch.

"Careful Black, he's had a hard night and a tiring day."

The admonishment floated above him with a waft of flower-warm-friend scent. In reply, a moist breath washed over his head with the smell of approaching-storm-spice-fire-packmate, and the mournful words,

"You don't know the half of it Evans."

Remus frowned and burrowed further into the angular chest, pleased when the arms tightened around him, holding him close to that comforting heat.

"I think you'll find that I do, Black. I've known for just over a fortnight now, and you have nothing to fear from me."

As she spoke, the grip on Remus tightened to painful, and the boy let out a quiet whine.

"Sorry Moony," came the deeper voice of approaching-storm-spice-fire-packmate, and the arms loosened a little. "I'm glad to hear it Evans. We've protected him for three years now, and I'll be damned if we let a chit like you spoil things." Remus smiled as he heard the hint of Irish in Sirius' dialect, courtesy of Peter's teachings and adopted to irritate his parents. "Are you the only one, Evans? The only one who knows?"

As Lily replied, the arms shifted around Remus, bringing his head up so that when he cracked an eyelid open, he could see a stretch of pale collarbone where Sirius' shirt had been dragged down on one side. He wriggled a little to press his cool nose into the dip above the bone, and inhaled the heady scent of packmate-friend-fire-storm-rain-spice. The torso shuddered a little, and a slightly husky voice said,

"D'you want to go to bed, Moony? Alright." In a louder voice, he continued, "You're not too bad Evans. Keep your promise, like we've kept ours. I mean – thank you."

Then there was movement, up and down and slightly side to side with each step, and then he was rising, only for the movement to be stopped by Lily's hushed call.

"Take the chocolate, Black. It will help with the cramps and fatigue." There was a smile in her voice as she finished. "After all, chocolate cures all. Goodnight Black; sleep well, Remus."

A brush of warmth over his forehead, the almost imperceptible weight of a chocolate bar placed on his finally loosening abdomen, and her presence was gone. The climbing sensation returned, and with it the chest beside him heaved with exertion. When, an eternity and a split second later, Remus felt himself lowered into a soft, cosy warmth (_bed_, his drowsy mind reminded him), he automatically grabbed his shifting packmate, pulling him down beside him with surprising strength for someone semi-unconscious. Something snapped under Sirius' hip, but Remus just shuffled into a comfortable curl around his torso, his head resting on the gentle curve of muscle between Sirius' shoulder and rib-cage. Sleep claimed him.

Sirius froze, then relaxed as he realised what was happening, and after a moment's hip wiggling, he managed to extract the crushed chocolate bar and drop it on the bedside table. With the same arm, he dragged the curtains as shut as possible, then draped it over Remus' middle, pulled the werewolf in to himself, and settled down for the night.


	2. The Girl

**Sol: This was almost finished when we posted the last chapter, but it took a little while to get it finished and read through.**

**Star: Read that as she couldn't figure out how to end it, so it may be a bit abrupt. I reckon it's alright, in comparison to some of her other drivel -**

**Sol: Hey!**

**Star: So make the most of it.**

**SolStar: We've already disclaimed this once, we're not doing so again. Check chapter one!**

The Girl

As much as she wanted to, Lily simply could not get comfortable. The floor was too hard; the sofa too yielding; a cushion too small; the chair too confining. Eventually, she ended up in the deep armchair by the common-room fire, curled in a ball on the red fabric, staring across the hearth into the dancing flames.

Dancing was the last thing she felt like doing at the moment. Her stomach was writhing with what felt like a menagerie of scorpions and poisonous serpents, and her abdomen was tightened into agonising knots. To top it off, she had started bleeding earlier, and knew it wouldn't stop for at least four days.

_Periods suck,_ she groaned in the privacy of her mind. _It's times like this that I wish I was a boy._

Lily's disgruntled musings were interrupted by a careful hand on her shoulder. A body moved around the chair, and Remus' kind, tired face moved into view.

"Good evening Lily," he said, his voice soft and a smile on his lips. "How are you this fine sunny evening?"

Lily twisted her head just enough to see a window across the Gryffindor common-room, where heavy autumn rain was making itself known with a repetitive dull thudding noise. She turned back to Remus and raised her eyebrows, smiling once he chuckled in reply.

"Well, this is Britain," he said. "You don't seem too happy though – what's wrong?"

Lily gave him a grimace as she tried to wiggle into a more comfortable position, then told him,

"I have cramps in my abs, an ache in my head, and am alternately delighted and nauseated by the very thought of food. I have also snapped enough at my best friend this morning that she has abandoned me to my agony and my own devices. Therefore, Remus, many things are wrong, and you can fix none of them." She bit her lip as she finished her tirade, suddenly realising what she was doing. "Sorry," she sighed. "I'm just irritable today."

"It's okay," replied Remus, understanding in his gaze. Then mischief appeared in his golden eyes, and he grinned. "I've got just the thing, too. I'm surprised you've forgotten, since you helped me out a couple of weeks ago." Lily watched warily, a hand pressed just below her ribcage, as Remus dropped his own hand into his pocket, fumbled a moment, and finally pulled out a bar of chocolate. Her face relaxed into a smile, and he broke it before opening the plastic. He placed a block in her free hand, then laughed when her eyes fluttered closed in delight as she ate it. She sighed, and the fist embedded in her stomach relaxed its pressure a little. When she opened her eyes, Remus offered her more sweet, rich chocolate and told her,

"A hot water bottle would help." She nodded briefly in agreement, and returned her attention to the chocolate bar, missing the devious sparkle in Remus' eyes.

"Hot water bottle, come here!" he called softly over her head and over the chair, and when her eyes flew open in surprise, she was horrified to see one insufferable speccy git standing beside Remus.

"I will be just fine, Remus, and even better without his company," she said coolly, glaring at the newest arrival to her cosy corner of the common-room. Remus smiled innocently as her eyes flicked back to him, and pushed the other boy down to sit on the floor by her chair, where he gazed up at her like an adoring puppy.

Remus gave her a 'who, me?' smile and the words,

"He'll be good. He doesn't even have his wand, so you can hex him to your heart's content if he's obnoxious."

Lily gritted her teeth.

"Remus," she ground out, "_I_ don't have my wand." Remus' smile faltered, and he shrugged. Then James piped up for the first time, suave grin in place.

"I have more chocolate, since you've finished that bar."

Lily blinked and glanced down at her hand, and lo and behold, all the chocolate was indeed gone, eaten while they argued. After a suspicious glance at James, she sighed and surrendered.

"Alright," she said, exchanging the empty wrapper for the new bar quickly retrieved from his robe pocket. To open it, her hands left her stomach, and she partially uncurled, only to jerk back with blazing eyes when she felt warm hands on the bottom of her shirt. James' hands were prevented from retreat by the position of her knees, and one leg almost itched to straighten and deliver him a kick to the side of the head. James' worried hazel eyes looked up at her, but he made no move to speak or retrieve his hands.

"What, exactly, did you think you were doing Potter?" asked Lily coldly. He gave her a pleading look as he replied.

"Sirius taught me how to do a massage to help Moony, and he said it helped with cramps, and he said that it worked even better with chocolate, and then he went off to molest Moony again, and then I thought it might help you and stop you hurting but if you don't want me to I'll stop and –"

Lily clapped a hand over his mouth, and he fell silent again. Remus watched with amusement.

"Alright. But Merlin help you, Potter, if you use this as an excuse to try to cop a feel."

She lay back slowly and stretched her legs out, wincing as her legs straightened and her stomach muscles stretched. Then warm hands were rubbing gentle circles into her abs through her shirt, and Remus' voice asked her,

"How did you enjoy the Herbology assignment, Lily?"

She pulled a face and answered,

"About as much as you did, I'd wager. Don't tell me you enjoyed handling the Wasposes? Or should I say mauling?"

Remus winced and replied,

"I can't say I did, but I didn't maul anything. It got me, that's all." Lily smirked as Remus ran his tongue over his bottom lip in remembered pain.

"Yes it got you, right in the mouth. How big was your lip when you got up to the hospital wing?"

Remus glared playfully, but replied,

"A couple of inches, actually. Madam Pomfrey got the venom out, but she still had to shrink my lip until Sirius said it was normal again, what with me _not being able to talk _and all."

Lily laughed, then jerked in her seat as James' hands pressed a little too hard. A glare and he was back to light movements, allowing her to continue the conversation over his head, pointedly ignoring his content smile.

"And how, exactly, did Sirius know how large your lip was supposed to be? Surely he hadn't been examining it _that_ closely." Remus blushed, and Lily crowed with laughter and triumph. "Remus! You sly dog! Well, how long has _that_ been going on for? Come on, I want details. You can hide _nothing_ from me Remus, so spill the beans. Who asked who? When did you kiss first? Do the other monstrosities know? – of course they do, who am I kidding. Come on! Spill!"

Remus' blush deepened as he replied.

"Actually, the first kiss was the morning after you introduced me to chocolate in a medical capacity, and he asked me out right afterwards, sort of. So about a fortnight, really, and it's your fault. Of course the rest of the Marauders know, and were there any more embarrassingly private details you wanted? Because that's all you're getting."

Lily almost pouted, but groaned instead when James' hands pressed a little too hard on her tightened stomach. He apologised, and she opened her mouth to complain when the portrait hole swung open, and Sirius stumbled in, arms laden with butterbeer, chocolate, and pumpkin pies. Remus smirked.

"I'm getting a little déjà vu here," he drawled, smiling warmly at Sirius, who told him,

"Yes, but last time you were the one being pampered, and Lily was the slave, like Prongs down there." Lily scowled at him, and James shot him a glare, but Remus just smiled slightly and patted the sofa beside him. Sirius didn't hesitate to take advantage and sit, pressing close to Remus and wrapping an arm around his waist. A slightly sober glance at Lily made Remus murmur,

"She knows," in the dark-haired boy's ear, and Sirius relaxed a little.

"You're okay with it, Evans?" His manner was polite, although his tone had a hard edge. Lily met the dark-haired boy's eyes and nodded, an upward curl at the corner of her lips.

"Always. Oh, and Black?" Sirius raised an eyebrow. "Hurt him and die." Sirius smiled as he turned his head to Remus, a softer smile than any Lily could remember seeing before.

"I couldn't," he replied, his voice equally soft.

James looked up and grimaced.

"Alright lovebirds, cut it out," he complained good-naturedly. Sirius shot him a cheerful glare, then turned as Remus addressed Lily.

"Seriously? _Don't say it, Sirius_. That was a new bar two minutes ago." Lily glanced down into her hand at the almost finished chocolate bar. She shrugged.

"My tummy hurts, the chocolate helps, and it tastes good to boot. You started it, anyway." Remus snorted, grinning.

"Not my fault I hurt so much and you make an excellent nurse."

While the two purebloods frowned in confusion at the Muggle term, Remus and Lily exchanged a small glare, which almost immediately dissolved into laughter as they could no longer contain their amusement.

"Me, a nurse?" Lily gasped.

"You'd make all the patients diabetic," chuckled Remus with a devilish grin, "Or kill them all from sugar overdose."

"At least they wouldn't have to suffer hospital food then," retorted Lily, her tongue as fiery as her hair and her temper. "That stuff tastes like plywood, and even that's an understatement." Remus winced, nodding in agreement while the dark-haired boys watched in increasing frustration and confusion. Sirius turned to James.

"Nurse?"

"Plywood?"

"Dibibetese?"

When the half-blooded werewolf nearly collapsed in hysterics at his boyfriend's attempt at pronunciation, the purebloods turned to Lily for help.

"Oh no, you're getting nothing from me," she told them with a smirk just short of full-blown laughter. "He's your boyfriend, Sirius, you talk to him."

"Oi!" Remus had apparently regained the ability to talk, and he glared at Lily, although he could not completely conceal his amusement. "To answer your questions, oh Marauders of lesser intelligence, a nurse is like an auxiliary Healer, plywood is a common Muggle building material made of shards of other woods, and _diabetes_, Padfoot, is a disease which means that the body cannot produce the right amounts of the hormone insulin. Happy now?" Both purebloods seemed particularly confused, but nodded anyway.

Lily rolled her eyes at Remus, who did the same.

"Of course you aren't, but we're going to leave it at that, aren't we?" Remus nodded in response to Lily's question, then glared as she tried to move and sighed as her muscles flexed and stretched without causing excruciating agony.

"James, can you let go of Lily now? Transfigure us a hot water bottle or something." Lily flashed her thanks to Remus and dropped the now-empty chocolate wrapper on the floor. Sirius bent over to pick it up, then glanced at Remus, grinning broadly at the look of approval. Lily snorted.

"You've got him well-trained then?" she asked Remus, only the flicker of her eyes indicating the subject of her question. One side of Remus' mouth lifted into a smile.

"Of course. Yours is equally tame, you realise – isn't it strange how they defer to us but no others?"

Lily smiled lopsidedly, flexing in her seat.  
"It is, rather. But would you have them any less defiant, if you could?"

Remus' smile softened.

"Never."

**_Finis_**


End file.
